The jury in the Aamir Siddiqi murder trial has heard the physique of one of the defendants matches the description of an assailant who stabbed the teenager in the back after he opened the front door of his Cardiff home.

The jury in the Aamir Siddiqi murder trial has heard the physique of one of the defendants matches the description of an assailant who stabbed the teenager in the back after he opened the front door of his Cardiff home.

The suggestion was made as Ben Hope, 39, was cross-examined by John Charles Rees QC, defending for co-accused Jason Richards.

During his questioning, Mr Rees put to Mr Hope: “I want to deal with the attack for a moment. We know it involved two men. We know it involved two men wearing a balaclava each on their head and each of them carrying a knife and also wearing gloves.”

Mr Rees said he wished to look at the descriptions of the two men as given by Aamir’s parents, who were injured trying to defend their son from the attacked.

Mr Rees said one man was described as slim, about 6ft tall and wearing a light-coloured jacket.

“He was the man who followed Aamir into the house and stabbed him in the back a number of times,” said Mr Rees.

He said Aamir’s mother, Parveen, had said the striking thing about the person who “effectively killed her son” was “his thinness”.

“He was tall and thin, a pretty good description of you,” suggested Mr Rees to Mr Hope.

Swansea Crown Court heard the second man who was involved in the incident at Ninian Road was described as “broader”.

Mr Hope had previously told the court he was in a “drugs stupor” in North Road at the time when Aamir was attacked on a Sunday afternoon in April 2010.

The court had also previously heard Mr Hope say in evidence that he borrowed clothes from Mr Richards on the day Aamir was attacked and left his old ones at Mr Richards’s home.

When asked why, Mr Hope said when he injected his arm with drugs blood smeared down him when he had fallen asleep in a stupor.

Mr Rees put to Mr Hope that his jacket became blood-stained when he stabbed Aamir in the back and “that is why we have never seen it again”.

Mr Hope replied: “That is wrong. I did not kill Aamir Siddiqi. I did not attack his parents.”

Mr Rees also put to Mr Hope that, within about three hours of the attack on Aamir taking place, he had bought new trainers, gone into two mobile phone shops and spent around £700 on a laptop.

Mr Rees told the court that, after leaving Footlocker, Mr Hope went into a mobile phone shop. “Not only have you thought about getting rid of your shoes, you started thinking about getting a new phone,” said Mr Rees.

Mr Hope replied: “My phone is a contract. I went in there just to browse.”

Mr Rees also questioned Mr Hope about why he had taken the laptop to a pawnbroker just two days after he bought it.

“Some people may think it’s strange someone buying a computer for £700 on Sunday and selling it for £200 on Tuesday,” said Mr Rees.

When asked why he didn’t want a buy-back date from the pawnbrokers, Mr Hope said it was a mistake on his part.

“You wanted to do anything to distance yourself from the murder,” said Mr Rees.

Mr Hope denied this was the case and said he had no reason to be worried.

The court had previously heard that Mr Hope gave a false name and address when he bought the laptop from PC World.

Mr Hope told the court this was because he wished to avoid being sent junk mail.

Promising student Aamir was stabbed when he opened the front door of his home in Ninian Road in April 2010.

Mr Hope and Mr Richards, 38, are on trial accused of Aamir Siddiqi’s murder. They are also accused of the attempted murder of Aamir’s parents who had both tried to stop their son from being attacked.

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